Kind of broad question: What do engineers do?

[Gibson486]

Engineers can do everything, but women.....

 

[TechnoKid]

Originally posted by: Dedpuhl

Originally posted by: TechnoKid
But, it also depends on what type of engineer you want to be, civil (about the easiest), mechanical, electrical, chemical (about the hardest imo, but chemists make a lot of money), bio-engineer....

It pisses me off when people call CE the "easiest" of the major disciplines. I knew some dumbasses that easily graduated in ChE and I knew very gifted students that had a hard time getting through CE. It depends on what path you take.

CE is very broad. It covers Environmental issues, Geotechnical Design (a.k.a. dirtwork), Materials Modeling, Transportation, Structural Design, Surveying and Water Resources. Some areas are easier than others.

I'm sure I could find an "easy" path through any of the main discipline groups.

Don't get me wrong, engineering in general is not "easy." My intro engineering instructor told me that if you're looking for an "easy" thing to do [in college], engineering is not it. Considering CE to other engineering courses, I found it to be more appealing than mechanical. And of course, like you said, it all depends on what course you follow. You don't know what you are going to be good at unless you try it.

 

[jaydee]

Just so you know, approximately 100% of my EE classes all involved calculus. Probably 1/3 of them involved a LOT of it (nearly all the math were calc problems).

 

[MrSanderzX]

I considered doing Engineering in college. Took it for three semesters and on the first day of the forth semester I decided to drop it and change to History.

I was initially in it for the money, but realized that the money isn't really that great. The best way to get ahead and the happiest people I had come in contact with in the business world were their own bosses. So, I went back to a company that I worked for in High School and have not looked back.

I guess what I am getting at is if you are going into Engineering do it because you love it. Eventually you will have to make a living doing something every day. You will have a better life if you enjoy it.

 

[sharkeeper]

Engineers can do everything, but women.....

Hmmm...

Most desirable females have a nice figure 8 curve. (x^2 + y^2)^2 = a^2(x^2 - y^2) (Lemniscate of Bernoulli)



Cheers!

 

[Triumph]

Engineers do everything. Really. But for a very broad definition, think of the show Modern Marvels on History channel. Engineers basically created everything you see on there. Civil engineers built the Autobahn, mechanical engineers design the giant earth movers, material science engineers make the kevlar, electrical/computer engineers make all the electronics, aerospace engineers make the submarines and F-22's, etc. There are engineers that handle every aspect of a product, well beyond just designing it on a computer. When a "thing" is being developed, there are engineers who handle the testing, manufacturing, logistics, safety, reliability, documentation, finances, quality control, and program management of that "thing." In most cases, it doesn't really even matter what that "thing" is, because the tools and knowledge needed to develop it are somewhat generic. It's this knowledge that they teach you in school.

Oh, and as far as school goes; Yes you take a lot of math and science courses. But really the underlying skill that you are developing is problem solving.

 

[cronos]

Originally posted by: Triumph
Oh, and as far as school goes; Yes you take a lot of math and science courses. But really the underlying skill that you are developing is problem solving.

bingo!

 

[rocadelpunk]

Originally posted by: Triumph
Engineers do everything. Really. But for a very broad definition, think of the show Modern Marvels on History channel. Engineers basically created everything you see on there. Civil engineers built the Autobahn, mechanical engineers design the giant earth movers, material science engineers make the kevlar, electrical/computer engineers make all the electronics, aerospace engineers make the submarines and F-22's, etc. There are engineers that handle every aspect of a product, well beyond just designing it on a computer. When a "thing" is being developed, there are engineers who handle the testing, manufacturing, logistics, safety, reliability, documentation, finances, quality control, and program management of that "thing." In most cases, it doesn't really even matter what that "thing" is, because the tools and knowledge needed to develop it are somewhat generic. It's this knowledge that they teach you in school.

Oh, and as far as school goes; Yes you take a lot of math and science courses. But really the underlying skill that you are developing is problem solving.

 

[Jeff7]

I guess what I am getting at is if you are going into Engineering do it because you love it. Eventually you will have to make a living doing something every day. You will have a better life if you enjoy it.

I guess that's why I need more research. Maybe it's not designing things that I'm after....though I am sort of designing a voltage booster to power a large array of LED's right now, along with a power regulator for that, but I'm really just adapting the manufacturer's spec sheets for the power booster chip, and other people's schematics, to suit my own needs. I am good at fixing things. Anything - if there's a problem with something, I like to figure out a solution, implement it, and make sure that it works.

Like today - worked on someone's computer. Spyware, and they wanted a hard drive upgrade. They were very happy with the service and the fact that their computer was working better than it was before. They'd already had someone else working on it too, but they'd apparently messed a few other things up. So I was called in. As Homer once said of his new toaster/time machine, but applicable here, "There, better than new." That's what I like - fixing a problem until the customer is happy with, and appreciative of, the result.

And it would appear then, as I scroll down farther in the thread, Triumph addresses this exact thing: Problems, and the solving thereof.

 

[Gibson486]

To be a succesful engineer, you have to know little of everything. Just b/c you are an EE does not mean you will do electronics (although that would be what most would hope for). It's the reason why Mechies learn circuits.

 

[Gibson486]

Originally posted by: Jeff7

I guess what I am getting at is if you are going into Engineering do it because you love it. Eventually you will have to make a living doing something every day. You will have a better life if you enjoy it.

I guess that's why I need more research. Maybe it's not designing things that I'm after....though I am sort of designing a voltage booster to power a large array of LED's right now, along with a power regulator for that, but I'm really just adapting the manufacturer's spec sheets for the power booster chip, and other people's schematics, to suit my own needs. I am good at fixing things. Anything - if there's a problem with something, I like to figure out a solution, implement it, and make sure that it works.

Like today - worked on someone's computer. Spyware, and they wanted a hard drive upgrade. They were very happy with the service and the fact that their computer was working better than it was before. They'd already had someone else working on it too, but they'd apparently messed a few other things up. So I was called in. As Homer once said of his new toaster/time machine, but applicable here, "There, better than new." That's what I like - fixing a problem until the customer is happy with, and appreciative of, the result.

And it would appear then, as I scroll down farther in the thread, Triumph addresses this exact thing: Problems, and the solving thereof.

Engineering is not all designing.....some of it is just taking current designs and just tweaking it. if you do firmware, then you will most likely take existing code and make chnages so it works with a more current design.

 

[shenaniganz]

Engineering is the profession of making assumptions other people don't have the balls to make.

 

[chuckywang]

Better question: What don't engineers do?

 

[dullard]

I think others covered it quite well. Engineers basically
(1) Research new ideas,
(2) Design new things,
(3) Improve existing things, and
(4) Maintain things.
The specific things you work with will vary from field to field, but the main ideas are the same.

I think most engineers are involved in a mixture of the above, but with lots of focus on #3 and #4. I think you can break it down to research vs management jobs. Many engineers have the job of low level management making sure a plant keeps running smoothly. This has very little if anything to do with the research in #1-#3. Of course if you don't like management but love equations, then you can do all sorts of things within #1-#3.

I myself am a chemical engineer. I think chemical engineers are the jack of all trades but masters of none. Pretty much we are required to learn a bit of everything - more so than the other more specialized engineering fields. Thus the result is a lot more homework but often the homework is fairly easy (leading to the discussion above of being hard vs dumbasses being able to graduate). What do I do? I design a machine - the guts (mostly complex math and computer simulations), the electronics (mostly learning by other schematics), the optics (off the shelf parts so that is nice), the case (I spend lots of hours with a drill press making parts by hand), the user interface (how does the user interact with the machine), the software (programming after programming), debugging (cutting edge new things fail often) everything to do with it. Of course I'm also part trainer and part salesman to get this machine off into the hands of end users. So basically an engineer can do a lot of different things.

To get to be an engineer, you do have to have a background in the fine details that many people dislike. That will include a lot of math, and a lot of basic science. If you really detest calculus, probably you'll detest engineering education. That doesn't mean you'll ever use math in your engineering job, but it is a good clue that engineering might not be the field for you.

 

[deerslayer]

Kind of broad answer: their job.

 

[Titan]

Realize that a good engineer never feels like he is creating something completely original. He is using his knowledge of technical things to plan and contribute to a real world project. Usually the creative adventurous stuff doesn't happen, and an engineer is just a cog in a bussiness who contributes to business goals. They offer valuable opinions to planners, management and even customers, so what they do has value, but often an engineers true desires are unempowered and we become cynical old men. Bottom line, an engineer's job is to THINK, and keep business running.

An engineer is not a guy sitting somewhere "making things." That's a mad scienctist.

An engineer is a professional in a bussiness and sometimes it is quite dull because it is overwhelmingly complicated. If you get into engineering, pick a technical field you like. Me, I like to code, I don't like making circuits, hence, I am a software engineer. (arguably not a "real" engineer, since we make air, hell we don't even make air)

You won't have any idea what it really means to be an engineer until you are one. Most engineering students have no clue.